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The Recognition of the Unitas Fratrum 
as an Old Episcopal Church by the 


: : Parliament of Great Britain in 1749 


BY 


The Rt. Rev. J. Taylor Hamilton, D.D. 


nk Reprint from 


- Transactions of the Moravian Historical Society 


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The Recognition of the Unitas Fratrum 
as an Old Episcopal Church by the 
Parliament of Great Britain in 1749 


BY 


The Rt. Rev. J. Taylor Hamilton, D.D. 


Reprint from 


Transactions of the Moravian Historical Society 


BETHLEHEM, Pa.: 
Times Publishing Company, 
1925 


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The Recognition of the Unitas Fratrum as an 
Old Protestant Episcopal Church by the 
Parliament of Great Britain in 1749. 

By BISHOP J. TAYLOR HAMILTON, D.D. 


A Paper read at the Annual Meeting of the Moravian 
Historical Society in 1924. 


The honored President of the Moravian Historical Society, the 
Rev. Dr. W. N. Schwarze, some time ago asked me to put to- 
gether data with regard to the important transactions which 
culminated in the recognition of the Unity of the Brethren by 
Parliament one hundred and seventy-five years ago. He very 
kindly aided me by pointing out the chief passages in reference 
to these transactions, in the Diary which in those days recorded 
the sayings and doings of Count Zinzendorf in his capacity of 
bishop and leader of our church. This diary in the years to 
which our research takes us back, is known as the ‘‘ Diarvwm der 
Huetten.’’ It furnishes absolutely contemporaneous data, 
recorded from the standpoint of the Brethren and of Zinzendorf 
in particular. In the Archives of our church in Bethlehem there 
are also printed copies of many of the documents presented to 
the Committees of the Houses of Parliament, and at least the 
titles of all the documents, one hundred and thirty-five in num- 
ber. Important are also the Memoirs of James Hutton, edited by 
Daniel Benham in 1856, for Hutton was a foremost actor in 
connection with the establishment of Moravian congregations in 
England. Light is also shed on what was done in 1749 by the 
so-called ‘‘Buedingische Sammlungen.’’ This is a collection of 
documents made under the direction of Zinzendorf and printed 
by his order during the years 1742 and 1745, when the center of 
the church’s administration was in Wetteravia, territory of the 
Counts of Buedingen; hence the name. Very valuable for our 
study is also the manuscript history of the Brethren’s Unity 
by the Rev. John Plitt, about a century ago the President of the 
Theological Seminary at Gnadenfeld, and after 1836 Archivist 
of our church at Herrnhut. A copy of this history is in the 
library of our Theological Seminary at Bethlehem. Last, but 


4 


not least, are the printed reports of the parliamentary debates 
in this connection, also to be found in our Archives. 


It was the Brethren themselves who took the initiative in the 
steps leading up to the transactions of Parliament. Their 
motives in doing this lie open to us. From the very first indica- 
tion of the intention of the Brethren to found a colony in 
Georgia, Court Chaplain Ziegenhagen, in London, a partisan of 
Halle, and Count Wernigerode, an avowed opponent of the 
Brethren in Germany, had endeavored to thwart the plan. And 
an influential party continued to influence the Court of George 
II against Zinzendorf and his co-workers. But Lieutenant Gen- 
eral Oglethorpe, the Governor of the incipient Colony, and Ver- 
non, Secretary to its Trustees, on examination into the affairs of 
the Brethren and through their personal intercourse with Spang- 
enberg, had long ago come to think otherwise. In Georgia 
Oglethorpe had enjoyed opportunity enough to judge the Breth- 
ren from personal observation and acquaintance, and when he 
later on met Count Zinzendorf in London, an intimate friendship 
ripened. In 17387 Archbishop Potter of Canterbury, who had 
also learnt to esteem the Count, testified to the Trustees of the 
Colony of Georgia of his esteem for the Brethren. | 


Yet all this could not prevent the troubles which arose in 
Georgia, when war with Spain broke out and the Moravian 
colonists stood on the promise they believed to have been given 
them, that they should be free from bearing arms. 


During the first visit of Zinzendorf to London, in 1737, he had 
organized a small society of Germans, who united for mutual 
edification, and when Boehler, Frederick Wenzel Neisser and 
Schulius were there on their way to South Carolina and Georgia 
in 1738, they naturally visited these Germans. As naturally 
John Wesley, on returning from Georgia, during the memorable 
voyage whither he had met the Moravians and where he had en- 
joyed intercourse with Spangenberg, sought the company of 
Peter Boehler, whom his friend Hutton introduced to him. The 
sequel is well known—Wesley’s reaching assurance of personal 
salvation, his temporary association with the Moravians, Hut- 
ton’s permanent association with them, the separation of the 
Methodists from the Moravians, the organization of the Moravian 
Society in the chapel in Fetter Lane, leased by them, on May 1, 


5) 


after Hutton’s house had become too small for their gatherings. 
This society was changed into a congregation, organized by 
Spangenberg on November 10, 1742, a license being obtained for 
it under the designation ‘‘Moravian Brethren, formerly of the 
English Communion,’’ a designation which became one of the 
main reasons why the title Moravian Church was popularly affixed 
to us for good or evil in English speaking lands. Meantime the 
influence of the Brethren had been widening. There had been 
a great revival of religion in Yorkshire under the lead of the 
Rev. Benjamin Ingham, a friend of the Brethren, who desired 
them as his co-workers. He indeed sought to place his converts, 
some three thousand, in their special care. The corner stone of 
a clergy-house and chapel was laid at Lamb’s Hill, later Fulneck, 
in Yorkshire, on May 12, 1746, as a center of work in the North. 
Brethren itinerated in Lancashire, Derbyshire, Cheshire. In and 
about Northampton there were warm friends. In Bedford a 
suciety was organized in 1742. Marystone House at Butter- 
mere in Wiltshire had been another center since 1741, and John 
Cennick after 1745 made use of it as a strategie point. There 
were other centers of influence in Bristol and Kingswood and in 
Cornwall. Before the end of this decade Cennick had set Dublin 
and Ulster astir in search for assurance of salvation, he and his 
coadjutors preaching to thousands of hearers in cottages and in 
the open air. And from Ireland he had gone to Wales, where 
similar results attended his testimony for Christ. 


Thus, although it does not seem that it had been the purpose 
of Zinzendorf and his co-workers to establish any permanent re- 
ilgious organization in Britain, Providence was leading, and the 
time had to come, when what had grown up through the leadings 
of Providence required some legally recognized status. 


Meanwhile the abandonment of Moravian colonization in 
Georgia, when in 1740 Peter Boehler and his companions as its 
last remnant accompanied George Whitefield to Pennsylvania 
and were guided to begin in that land of liberty of conscience, 
what Spangenberg’s previous explorations had prepared for, 
namely, a permanent settlement in the Forks of the Delaware, 
Zinzendorf’s thoughts were turned with more and more urgency 
te the opportunities that constituted a call of God to work in 
these parts in various ways. The Indian Mission was begun. 


6 


Nazareth and Bethlehem emerged, and then came Zinzendorf’s 
own visit from December, 1741, to January, 1743; there followed 
the Brethren’s part in the Great Awakening, Spangenberg’s first 
period of Administration, the Era of the Economy, the Organ- 
ization of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 1745, to 
promote Home and Foreign Missions—in short, the preparations 
for the vigorous onrush of our Church in our own land. But 
neither in Britain nor in her colonies were our Brethren permit- 
ted to work undisturbed. War between France and Great 
Britain furnished a welcome occasion for the machinations of 
those whose occupation was affected by the promotion of godly 
living—for example the liquor-sellers of the frontier, who looked 
askance at men whose influence deprived them of Indian custom- 
ers. And war, as ever, bred suspicion of everything foreign. It 
was known that the French sought to rouse the Indians of the 
borders of Canada and of the regions west of the Alleghanies 
against the English and their settlements. The hasty conclusion 
was drawn, that the villages of eonverted Indians in the border- | 
lands of Connecticut and New York were also a possible source 
of danger, might harbor hostiles. The Moravians with their re- 
gard for festivals of the Church Year and their liturgical ser- 
vices, to Puritans and to those who disliked ritual appeared to 
savor of Papacy. Possibly theological animosity also contributed 
to the rising animosity, for the Moravians disagreed with rigid 
Calvinism and its fixed predestinarian dogmas—and dogma 
counted for much at that time. Governor Clinton of New York 
was influenced against the Moravians. The Assembly of New 
York, in 1744, passed a harsh act against ‘‘ Vagrant preachers, 
Moravians and Papists,’’* and made the oath of allegiance 
obligatory in order that a license to preach might be obtained, 
under penalty of a fine of forty pounds and six months imprison- 
ment for the first offense, with other penalties for a repetition. 
The missionaries Post and Zeisberger were thrown into jail for 
seven weeks, till Governor Thomas of Pennsylvania interposed 
in their behalf. 


In Britain also there had been serious trouble. The last at- 
tempt of the Stuarts to recover the throne was made when Charles 
Edward landed in Scotland in March, 1744, and England did not 


' * Similar acts were known in other Colonies. 


7 


feel free from anxiety till his utter defeat at Culloden, on April 
27, 1746. That was an era of annoyance for the Brethren, not- 
withstanding the fact that at a conference of their workers, held 
in Yorkshire the very month after the Pretender’s landing, an 
address to the throne was drawn up by them, assuring of their 
Protestantism and of their loyalty to the House of Hanover. 
This address, in which they were entitled His Majesty’s Protest- 
ant Subjects, the United Brethren in England in connection 
with the Old Protestant and Episcopal Bohemian and Moravian 
Church, was presented to King George II by Hutton and Ing- 
ham. In spite of it homes and places of worship of the Brethren 
in Yorkshire were searched for arms and ammunition, since it 
was Slanderously asserted, that large chests full of these were 
concealed in the cellars under their chapels. The mob threatened 
to level the clergy-house and chapel at Fulneck to the ground. 
Ockershausen was arrested and taken to York Castle. In Bed- 
ford, Heckewelder and Wade were arrested. Brown was im- 
pressed for military service in Nottingham. In every ease re- 
lease followed. The object had been to force these preachers to 
do military service. In Broadoaks, Metcalf was threatened by a 
mob, whose loyalty was appeased when they found the Bible and 
a copy of the Book of Common Prayer lying side by side on his 
parlor table. Previous to this services had been intermitted in 
one of the meeting places of the Brethren in London on account 
of rudely hostile demonstrations. They came more and more to 
realize that they had no legal status as a chureh in Great Britain 
and, therefore, could not appeal to the law in protection of their 
worship. Licenses for their chapels had been procured in certain 
places from justices of the peace. But now they sought legal 
advice, and were told that as members of a foreign Protestant 
church they had no standing before the law, existed as congrega- 
tions merely on sufferance, wholly dependent on His Majesty’s 
good pleasure. 

In December, 1744, Hutton had written to Zinzendorf at 
Marienborn, urging him to bring the Moravian cause publicly 
before Parliament, in view of the fact that the hostile act passed 
by the Colony of New York would need confirmation. He had 
hopes that the Privy Council would interpose a veto. He stated 
that the Brethren in England were themselves opposed to secur- 


8 


ing licenses as dissenters; for they claimed, that doctrinally, 
they were not dissenters. This letter Hutton followed up by a 
visit to Zinzendorf in person to urge the matter. The Synod of 
Marienborn, in January, 1745, decided to make an appeal to 
Lord Granville, at this time the Prime Minister, to the Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury and to the Board of Trade and Plantations. 
Documents relating to the constitution of the Brethren’s Church 
and to the experiences made in America, together with a petition 
addressed to the Board of Trade and signed by the authorities 
of the Church, were forwarded to Martin Dober and Wenceslaus 
Neisser, at that time the leaders in England, for presentation. 
Furthermore, Abraham von Gersdorf, who had represented the 
Brethren’s Church in negotiations with the court of Prussia, was 
sent to London to interview the governmental authorities of 
Britain. His interviews disclosed that it was not within the 
prerogative of the home government to rescind an Act of a 
Colony ; but a promise was given, that the Board of Trade would 
recommend this very thing to New York. Though we do not read 
of a formal rescinding of the obnoxious Acts, it seems that they 
were silently buried; for a resumption of quiet activity of the 
Brethren was permitted. But annoyances of various sorts con- 
tinued in England. 


The visit of Count Zinzendorf to London in 1747 gave him 
opportunity to renew acquaintance with old friends, like Arch- 
bishop Potter of Canterbury, who ten years previously had ex- 
pressed his hearty approval of his consecration as a Bishop of 
the Moravian Church, and to form new and valuable friend- 
ships. Amongst the latter were Thomas Penn, the Proprietor of 
Pennsylvania, and General Oglethorpe, both of whom had suffi- 
cient acquaintance with the Brethren. With these two Zinzen- 
dorf consulted as to some legal way to secure the Brethren in 
Britain and in British colonies from further annoyances and to 
obtain a recognized status for the Unitas Fratrum. When he 
himself returned to the Continent, Henry Cossart was appointed 
as special agent for this business. 

In November of this year Cossart reported, that in the opin- 
ion of Penn and Oglethorpe a parlamentary inquiry ought to 
be set on foot, and that the bearings of the Pennsylvania Act of 
Kebruary 3, 1743, appeared to afford a good basis for such an 


9 


inquiry. According to this act foreign Protestants who like the 
Quakers declined from conscientious scruples to take an oath, 
might like them be permitted to be naturalized under certain 
conditions. Penn himself said that none else than the Moravians 
had been meant by the term ‘‘Foreign Protestants.’’ Now, in 
1740, it had been enacted by the British Parliament that all 
foreign Protestants after a residence of seven years, should, 
upon taking the Oath of Allegiance, be considered as naturalized, 
free of any expense. The Quakers alone being exempted from 
taking the oath. This act General Oglethorpe, as a member of 
the lower House, on April 6, 1747, on the strength of the Penn- 
sylvania Act of 1743, moved to amend by inserting a clause in 
favor of the ‘‘Moravian or United Brethren,’’ exempting them 
from the taking of an oath. His proposal was accepted without 
opposition and the act received royal sanction on June 28. 
Oglethorpe considered that it carried with it for the future 
‘‘proof that the Moravian Church is a Protestant Church, 
acknowledged by Parliament, for otherwise we should not have 
been permitted to insert this clause in the Act.’’ But this merely 
tacit acknowledgment was not sufficient for Zinzendorf. And 
he was doubtless right. He desired an open and thorough public 
investigation. 7 

Synods in Herrnhaag and Zeist, in September and October, 
1748, again busied themselves with the matter of an investigation 
by Parliament, and five men were appointed deputies of the 
Church to petition for this. They were Barons Abraham von 
Gersdorf, Louis von Schrautenbach, and Charles von Schach- 
mann; and David Nitschmann, the Syndic, and Henry Cossart. 
With Zinzendorf they sailed from Holland on December 31, and 
reaching Harwich next day were in London on January 4, and 
took up their residence in a house in Bloomsbury, which Zinzen- 
dorf had leased for three years. He had also similarly acquired 
a country-home at Ingatestone Hall, some twenty miles from 
London, deeming it wise to live in a style appropriate to his rank 
while these negotiations were in progress. 


The deputies of the Brethren had scarcely set foot in London 
when the hand of their opponents was disclosed. The public 
papers contained a reprint of an edict expelling the Brethren 
from the Kingdom of Hanover—a rather curious proclamation 


10 


in view of the fact that Hanover contained no Brethren to ex- 
pel. It was manifestly intended to bring discredit upon them in 
England. But the publication of this Hanoverian edict proved 
a false move on the part of the Court party, the opponents of the 
Brethren. They thus overshot their mark, for the edict won for 
the Brethren friends from among the opposition. Zinzendorf 
consulted Oglethorpe and Chevalier de Schaub, a friend made by 
him long ago during his youthful visit to Paris. The latter 
undertook to make representations to the Prime Minister of 
Hanover. But he had been so completely biased by the writ- 
ings of Zinzendorf’s enemies, that he stubbornly declined to 
listen to any other information on the subject from any other 
source whatever. Cossart also now came with very discouraging 
news. The Bishop of Lincoln doubted whether the Brethren 
were the successors of the Old Brethren’s Unity. The Bishop 
of London, Sherlocke, would oppose the petition for religious 
toleration. It looked as if the Act of 1747 had been passed only 
with the passive consent of many, and that the Bench of Bishops 
would be hostile, when it came to applying its terms. The advice 
of the English friends was to obtain a thorough investigation by 
Parliament through a petition for something definite. And 
the fact that the ‘‘Irene,’’ which had come from Holland, lay in 
the Thames with one hundred and fifty Moravian colonists bound 
for Pennsylvania, suggested the form which the petition should 
take—namely, a request for exemption from legal oaths and 
from the bearing of arms in favor of colonists of the Brethren’s 
Church in America. This might lead to a request for the same 
privileges for Brethren in Britain. At any rate the petition 
would bring on an investigation of the entire status of the 
Brethren’s Church. 


Count Zinzendorf was himself opposed to securing an investi- 
gation by any such circuitous way. But he yielded to the repre- 
sentations that Palhament would busy itself only with something 
concrete, and he at length specially empowered the five deputies 
to prepare such a petition. In discharging their task it would 
appear they availed themselves of frequent consultations with 
General Oglethorpe and with Thomas Penn, and that their pur- 
pose was early communicated to the Speaker of the House and 
to Lord Halifax. Whether already at this stage they secured 


Va 


the services of Mr. Counsellor White, who later became their 
legal adviser in connection with the parliamentary negotiations, 
is not clear, though very probable. At any rate a petition was 
drawn up, and on February 20, at noon, General Oglethorpe pre- 
sented it to the House of Commons, for the five Deputies, in spite 
of the fact that he personally had been requested by the Bishop 
of Lincoln, at the instigation of persons high in office, to have 
nothing to do in the matter. 


In its title and as worded, the petition itself had reference 
only to the Brethren in the colonies, not to the Brethren’s 
Church in England. It stated that they already had settlements 
in British territories; that they would have had many more, if 
they had met with proper support; that by this they did not 
mean financial aid, for they asked none, being well able to main- 
tain themselves from their own resources and by their own in- 
dustry ; but what they required was religious liberty, and in par- 
ticular exemption from taking oaths and from rendering military 
service, since against both many of the Brethren had scruples of 
conscience. They therefore asked this privilege for the ancient 
Protestant Church of the Brethren, which in former times had 
repeatedly been succored in its distress by kings and govern- 
mental authorities of Great Britain, that those of its members 
who have conscientious scruples about taking oaths may be per- 
mitted to affirm instead and that in regard to bearing arms in 
America they may be set on such a footing as is suitable to their 
conscience, and that in America they may have the same privi- 
leges as English subjects enjoy. 


This petition General Oglethorpe now presented to the House 
of Commons, and moved that the House should cooperate with 
the Brethren in encouraging their settling in the British 
Colonies. Plumtree, the Treasurer, under the influence of higher 
personages, strongly opposed the motion in a speech which Zin- 
zendorf characterized as a cunning abstract of all the libellous 
publications that had appeared against the Brethren, and closed 
with an amendment, that the petition should be rejected. To 
him in turn replied five members, the most prominent of whom 
were Sir Horace Walpole, Sydenham and Privy Councillor Sir 
William Young. With only Plumtree voting in the negative, 
the House decided on the appointment of a committee of forty- 


12 


one to investigate the affairs of the Brethren as brought to its 
notice by the petition, Oglethorpe being appointed chairman and 
Plumtree being also given membership in it. Amongst other 
names that of the later famous William Pitt appears. Its first 
session was held on March 6. 


The intervening fortnight was a busy one for Zinzendorf and 
the Deputies of the Brethren, especially for Von Gersdorf. and 
Cossart. For it became known that an intrigue was on foot 
against the Brethren. But the Count also had friends at court, 
and now proceeded to counter this intrigue by making use of his 
connections. For instance, the Princess of Wales, the wife of 
Prince Frederick, became interested in the Brethren, through 
Esther Gruenbeck, who had been one of her playmates in child- 
hood. Previous to this the Eskimos, brought from Greenland on 
the Irene, had been brought to her at her desire and she granted 
Cossart a private audience of a couple of hours. Indeed, from 
now on till the passage of the Act in May, the Diarium der Huet- 
ten has many notices of visits paid to and by all manner of high 
personages—Lord Halifax, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Prime 
Minister Pelham, Lord Stanhope, Lord Carlisle, the Bishop of 
Lincoln, Lords Sandwich, Bathurst, Sandys, the Duke of New- 
castle, the Viceroy of Ireland, Lord Harrington, and the former 
Viceroy, the Earl of Chesterfield; Sir Thomas Robinson, Am- 
bassador to Vienna; the Lord Chancellor, Dr. Wilson, Chaplain 
of the Prince of Wales, himself a son of Bishop Wilson of Sodor 
and Man, one of Zinzendorf’s oldest friends in Britain, ete. 
Oglethorpe and Chevalier Schaub were in constant consultation 
with Zinzendorf and the Deputies. Cossart was especially in- 
defatigable in gathering documentary evidence in support of the 
petition, and Counsellor White, whom the Brethren had engaged, 
arranged the one hundred and thirty-five papers, thus brought 
forward, under seventeen heads. 


I suppose that of chief interest to us are the following points: 

The United Brethren have settlements in North America. In 
all the lists showed 812 persons belonging to these settlements, 
counting the 150 on the Irene, lying in the Thames and about 
to sail. 395 were in Bethlehem and Nazareth and vicinity. It 
may be also worthy of note, that at a Synod held in London in 
January that year rather more than 2,600 are reckoned as in 


13 


connection with the Brethren in England, not counting some 
560 children, visited by workers of the Brethren and a couple 
of hundred of Ingham’s society members, ‘‘who will in time also 
be eared for by us.’’ And this list makes no mention of either 
Ireland or Wales. In the course of the proceedings it appears 
that the total membership was estimated at above 20,000 persons 
over 14 years of age, and not reckoning those who were still in 
concealment in Moravia, Bohemia and other Slavonian lands. 


Further, they are acknowledged’ as an ancient Protestant 
Episcopal Church, of Eastern origin, who were regarded as such 
in England in former times, particularly under Edward VI, 
Charles II, and George II, and were and are likewise so regarded 
in other countries by men of other churches. They have received 
assistance in England both in former and in recent days. As 
evidence of this, amongst the rest, a document was presented 
from Neophytus, Patriarch of Constantinople, addressed in 1740 
to all Patriarchs, Metropolitans and Bishops in behalf of the 
Moravian Church. Further, four communications, original 
copies, from Bishop Daniel Ernst Jablonski, the grandson of 
Bishop John Amos Comenius, and himself a bishop of the Polish 
branch of the old Brethren’s Unity, that was still existing, 
though he himself was court-chaplain of kings of Prussia. In 
these letters he explicitly recognizes the congregation at Herrn- 
hut as a true continuation of the Bohemian Moravian branch of 
the Unitas Fratrum, of which branch, but not of the whole Unity, 
Comenius had been the last bishop. In 1737, Sitkovius, Bishop 
of the branch of the Unity in Poland and Lithuania, with seat 
at Lissa, had similarly recognized the succession. In one of his 
letters Jablonski writes, that when about twelve years previously, 
that is in 1718 or 1719, some hostile persons in England had 
denied that the old Unitas Fratrum possessed the true episcopal 
succession, an investigation had been ordered by Dr. Wm. Wake, 
Archbishop of Canterbury, and he, Jablonski, had at that time 
satisfied him as to the legitimacy of this episcopate. Testimonials 
of Luther, Bucer, Calvin and Musculus as to this old church were 
also produced. A sermon was advanced, preached in 1715 in 
London by Dr. Bennet, a divine whose knowledge of ecclesias- 
tical history was admitted, in which he considered the episcopacy 
of the Polish branch of the Unitas Fratrum and emphatically 


14 


asserted its canonicity. The book of Chancellor Pfaff, of the 
University of Tuebingen, De Successione Episcopali, was also re- 
ferred to in this connection. In the days of Charles II the 
bounty of the Church of England had been extended to the 
Unity in Poland, because it was a Protestant Episcopal Church; 
and this bounty had saved it from ruin. For the same reason 
King George and his Privy Council in 1715 had ordered collec- 
tions to be taken in the churches of England for its relief. When 
certain commissioners associated with Dr. Bray, most of them 
being Trustees of the Colony of Georgia, had asked the Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury, Dr. Potter, for his opinion about the 
Brethren, on March 2, 1737, he gave a favorable reply, that it 
was ‘‘an apostolic and episcopal church, not sustaining any 
doctrines repugnant to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church 
of England.’’ 


Candor compels me to state here, that in his zeal Cossart ad- 
duced as further proof of the friendly recognition of the Breth- 
ren by the Church of England in former days the fact, that King 
Edward VI assigned the Church of St. Augustine, in London, 
to the exiled Brethren under the ministry of John a Lasko, whom 
he styles a bishop of the Unity, and whom King Edward ap- 
pointed to be one of the Commissioners for examining into 
ecclesiastical laws. We should throw out this piece of evidence 
as containing error. However, though it is erroneous in the light 
of modern researches into ecclesiastical history, it does not vitiate 
the point which it is supposed to support, for that point is suffi- 
ciently supported without it. We know that John a Lasko never 
was a bishop of the Brethren. He was a scion of a distinguished 
noble family of Poland, and was himself a nephew of the Arch- 
bishop of Gnesen, Primate of Roman Catholic Poland. Highly 
educated, having studied at the University of Bologna in Italy, 
and holding a large number of lucrative posts in the Roman 
Catholic Church of his own land, amongst others that of Secre- 
tary to the King, he nevertheless embraced the tenets of the 
Reformation and became a friend and companion of Erasmus at 
Basel. For the faith’s sake, in 1542, he gave up the most bril- 
lant prospects in Poland and went into exile, at first to Emden 
in Friesland. Thence to England in 1550, where he became a 
geuest of Archbishop Cranmer. The ecclesiastical authorities of 


15 


England placed him at the head of a congregation of religious 
exiles from the continent in London, and there be served till the 
death of the king three years later, when Mary’s accession drove 
him once more forth as a wanderer. Persecutions and annoy- 
ances alike from Roman Catholics and strongly confessional 
Lutherans—for a Lasko was Reformed in doctrine—drove him 
from place to place, till in 1556 he returned to his home land. 
So far from being a minister, much less a bishop of the Breth- 
ren’s Unity, a Lasko now gave himself to the work of opposing 
that union of Protestants, which the Brethren had effected at 
Kosminek the year before, for he disliked their discipline and con- 
sidered their doctrinal standpoint not sufficiently sharply de- 
fined, and in general thought that the Union of Kosminek, in 
furthering their influence, placed the Protestant Church of 
Poland too much under the domination of the Unitas Fratrum, 
which he regarded as essentially a foreign, that is, Bohemian 
and Moravian body. 


But to return to our main theme. Having substantiated the 
character of the Unitas Fratrum as an old Protestant episcopal 
and orthodox church, uniting in itself adherents of the Augs- 
burg and the Helvetic confessions of faith, other points posited 
among the seventeen that have interest today, are these, that it 
was reasonable to grant such of its adherents as had conscientious 
scruples exemption in America from the judicial oath and from 
military service. Evidence was produced to prove that when the 
Brethren sought permission to settle in a land, in the preliminary 
negotiations, they laid stress on securing such exemptions. In 
proof of this assertion they produced a letter of the Dean of the 
royal chapel and cabinet councillor of Christian VI, of Denmark, 
to a minister of the Brethren in 1741; the exemption from the 
oath granted by the States of Utrecht in Holland; and the article 
in the grant for Silesia and a rescript of Frederick the Great of 
Prussia, 1746, exempting them from bearing arms. 


In connection with the request for the second exemption on be- 
half of such of their Brethren as had scruples about military 
service, the Brethren assured of their willingness to pay the sums 
that might be assessed on others who could not do military ser- 
vice on account of age or sex or other disabilities. 


16 


This mass of material, 135 documents of varied length and 
importanee, the investigating committee of the House had before 
it when it met on March 6. The Moravian Deputies were present 
and their Archivist, Francke, and also Gambold, the future 
bishop, as registrator and translator. Plumtree, who had vigor- 
ously opposed in Parliament, put many questions, which Ogle- 
thorpe answered. Admiral Vernon is mentioned as taking 
special interest in the affair. A further session was held on the 
10th. On the 25th Oglethorpe reported for the Committee in the 
House of Commons at considerable length. The findings of the 
Committee must have been favorable, for when Oglethorpe 
moved that leave be given to prepare a bill for encouraging the 
people known by the name of Unitas Fratrum or Moravians to 
settle in His Majesty’s Colonies in America, there appears to 
have been no opposition, and the Speaker appointed Oglethorpe 
himself as chairman of a committee to prepare the Bill. The 
printing of the more important documents was also ordered. 
Counsellor White seems to have been employed to aid in drafting 
the Bill so that it might suit the Brethren. On the 28th it was 
presented and passed its first reading without opposition. When 
it was read for the second time on April 1, objection was made 
that the Bill contained more than its title implied. The title 
seemed to be limited to America, but in the text freedom from 
military service in Britain was also implied. Oglethorpe ex- 
plained that this was necessary, for otherwise the Brethren 
would have to send their colonists to America from Holland and 
this was impolitic, if the country expected the Brethren to obtain 
their supplies in England. The upshot of this debate was, that 
the Bill itself was referred to a new committee, consisting of 
seventy members of the House. 


The Easter holidays now intervened. On the 17th of April 
the second committee sat, and whilst it found the statements con- 
tained in the Bill to be correct, it suggested certain verbal amend- 
ments. Next day it was brought before the House as thus 
amended, and was passed for the third time, and ordered to be 
engrossed on parchment. Oglethorpe was appointed to take it 
to the House of Lords for their concurrence. 

Here opposition was to be looked for, if the information re- 
ceived by the Brethren was correct. The Duke of Neweastle was 


17 


thought to be opposed and also several of the Bishops, on account 
of questions they entertained with respect to the orthodoxy of 
the Brethren. But work had been done in their favor without 
the knowledge of the Brethren, by the Bishops of Worcester and 
Lincoln and by the Chaplain of the Prince of Wales, a son of that 
Bishop of Sodor and Man who had been a friend of the Brethren. 
A meeting of Bishops had been called by the Archbishop of 
Canterbury at his residence in Kensington, and it appears that 
two considerations had proven of special weight. In the great 
majority of the American Colonies the churches were non- 
episcopalian. It was argued: Might not the granting of a favor- 
ed position to the Moravians, who were Episcopalians, lead to 
advantages for the Established Church of England? Possibly 
the appointment of suffragan bishops might follow. Or over- 
sight over English Episcopalian churches in the Colonies might 
be entrusted to Moravian bishops. Besides, even in England 
the coming of apostolic people like these should be regarded as 
the arrival of unexpected and welcome auxiliaries, for the 
preaching of the cross of Christ had been relegated too much to 
the background since the influence of Tillotson gave vogue to a 
sermonizing that stressed cold morality with an almost losing 
sight of Christ as Saviour. The spiritual poverty of the land 
had to be too obviously admitted, said the bishops. Therefore 
they agreed among themselves that they would not oppose the 
bill in the House of Lords. 

Accordingly, when Oglethorpe brought the Bill to the Upper 
House, on April 21, and Lord Halifax, President of the 
Board of Trade, moved that it be taken up, there was general 
surprise, when upon the Duke of Neweastle’s asking if the 
Bishops were content with the Bill the reply was made that they 
had nothing against it. But on its second reading the minister- 
ial or court part, who had been taken by surprise, moved that 
the case should be referred to a committee of the whole house 
for renewed inquiry. On the very next day the Brethren became 
aware that the influence of the court-party was being exerted 
against them and that they must now expect serious opposition. 
But as noted before, the Brethren were not without their friends 
amongst the nobility. The Bishops of Worcester and London, 
for instance, won over Frederick, Prince of Wales, and he in 


18 


turn the Duke of Argyle and the Lords of the Scotch Presby- 
terian Church. Yet the Chancellor, Hardwyke, and the Secre- 
tary of State, Newcastle, and the Duke of Cumberland were 
known to be opposed, so that friendly Lord Halifax feared the 
cause was lost for the Brethren. 


Finally, after various postponements effected by opponents, 
the third reading came up in the House of Lords, sitting as Com- 
mittee of the Whole, with the Earl of Warwick in the chair, on 
May 7. It must have been an interesting debate. The Lord 
Chaneellor, Hardwyke, opened with an attack on the Bill. He 
admitted that the facts it cited were true, and had nothing to say 
as to the Protestantism and Episcopacy of the Brethren. The 
inquiry made by the Committee of the Commons had been 
thorough and careful. But he objected strenuously that the 
provisions of the Act, as it now stood, would extend to the 
Brethren in Britain as well as in America, and that if freedom 
from bearing arms were granted to the Brethren, it would be 
hurtful to the realm, for in time of war dissenters, especially 
Methodists, would flock into their church to escape military duty. 
Further the apparent power of jurisdiction eranted to Zinzen- 
dorf in ecclesiastical affairs, though a foreigner, viz., that he 
should have power to enjoin bishops and ministers of the Breth- 
ren to issue certificates of membership to persons, which certifi- 
eates in turn must be accepted at law as proofs of membership, 
was contrary to English law, for not even bishops of the Estab- 
lished Church had power to issue such certificates. However, 
quite a number of Lords, secular and ecclesiastical, opposed the 
Chancellor and spoke in favor of the Brethren, advocating the 
acceptance of the Bill. Lord Granville pointed out that the ex- 
emption of the Quakers from bearing arms had done no detri- 
ment to the realm, and that the very affirmation of the Brethren 
in the form they suggested, being made as in the presence of God 
ix whom they believed, was more solemn than many an oath 
taken in the customary way. Sandys said that the certificates 
referred to in the Bill were quite a different matter from affairs 
of jurisdiction to which the Chancellor had referred; that simi- 
lar certificates were known in England. Neweastle on the other 
hand expressed his hesitation in connection with a people too 
scrupulous to defend a land to which they came as dwellers; but 


1 


Argyle replied that he had no doubt but that those of the 
Brethren who had no scruples with regard to military service 
would take care to defend the weaker in case of necessity. The 
Bishop of Worcester testified to the antiquity of the Brethren’s 
Church, to the good repute of these people, and their usefulness 
in a land where good morals were neglected. He asserted that 
neither of the exemptions asked for were doctrinal tenets with 
the Brethren. Not all their members had such seruples. These 
scruples might be dropped easily in the course of time, and quite 
forgotten. In the meantime Neweastle conferred with Ogle- 
thorpe and then announced that he would not oppose consent to 
the Bill. But the Chancellor’s objections were not removed, and 
he succeeded in securing an adjournment to the 12th. 


When on that day final debate came on, it was found that Lord 
Halifax had removed the chief objection of the Chancellor, with 
regard to the certificates of membership, which bishops or min- 
isters of the Brethren should issue, by inserting a clause requir- 
ing also the verbal declaration of the man himself, who asked 
exemption, as to his actual membership in the Brethren’s Church, 
which would give a magistrate opportunity to question him and 
also investigate the facts in connection with his alleged member- 
ship, and would also carry with it the same penalty as that for 
perjury, in case of his making false statements. But Halifax 
himself now spoke against the Bill, putting forward very force- 
fully all the arguments of its opponents—much to the surprise 
of all present, especially of the Bishop of London, who by his 
changes of countenance and by his restlessness was evidently 
impatient to spring up and reply. Then came the second sur- 
prise. Halifax himself took up the objections he had advanced 
sereatim and refuted them one by one so thoroughly that there 
was nothing more to be said. The Bishop of Worcester added: 
‘‘The United Brethren gladly consent to the amendment of the 
Lord Chancellor and its insertion in the Act. It will be an edi- 
fication to myself and the whole Episcopal Bench, and all true 
Protestants of England, if the British nation expresses itself in 
favor of the Brethren, for whatever benefit England confers 
upon this ancient confessor-church, must be an encouragement 
to all evangelical Christians throughout the world, to expect 
nothing but good from this country.’’ At these words, ‘‘Con- 


20 


tent’’ was eried out all over the House. That is, apart from 
certain verbal and minor amendments, the Lords expressed their 
concurrence with the Commons. On May 19 the House of Com- 
mons approved of these amendments, made by the Lords, and in 
their turn gave their assent to the Bill as it was now framed. 


At last, on June 6, Parliament was notified that the Act had 
received the King’s signature, and so became law of the realm. 
It was to go into effect on June 24. 


Now from all the foregoing it is clear that the chief importance 
of the Act lay in Parliament’s thus acknowledging the Unitas 
Fratrum to be an old Protestant Episcopal Church and in its 
recognizing that the resuscitated Brethren’s Church as organ- 
ically connected with the Church of John Amos Comenius, this 
recognition giving the Brethren legal status as an ecclesiastical 
body in harmony with the Protestant Episcopal Church estab- 
lished by law in Great Britain. So its members were protected 
from future annoyances, at least from such attempted under 
alleged legal form, by those who sought to attach to them the 
opprobrium of being unrecognized dissenters or Roman Catho- 
lics. The main importance of the Act did not le in its securing 
the two exemptions contained in the body of the bill. This is 
plain from recorded sayings of Zinzendorf during the period 
when the transactions of Parliament took place, from the word- 
ing of the Act itself, and also from the effect of the passage of 
the Act in the prestige which was thus gained by the Brethren in 
England. The Diary of Zinzendorf (Diarium der Huetten) on 
Ferbruary 20, the day when the petition was presented to the 
House and the Committee of investigation appointed, records his 
saying that he has thus already attained his purpose, for what he 
specially desired was an investigation of the Chureh and its 
operations. On March 11 it records him as again declaring in 
an address: ‘‘People now think that freedom from the oath and 
from war are the important matters for us. This is, however, not 
the case. If we obtained neither, the whole of the negotiations 
would not be lost * * *. Least of all a1e we seeking eclat and 
special privilege.’’ 

The Bishop of Worcester was doubtless correct, when he said 
in the House of Lords, that neither rejection of the oath nor re- 
fusal to bear arms under all conditions constituted doctrinal 


21 


tenets of the Brethren’s Church as such. Differences of opinion 
existed among them with regard to both points. As to the oath, 
we find on page 401 of Die Buedingischen Sammlungen, Vol. I, 
the statement that there are cases when one may and should 
take an oath with a good conscience. But it remains for each 
Brother to judge for himself. One can not compel such an one 
who conscientiously objects. It is also stated that the Moravians, 
meaning those who came from Moravia, the out and out ones re- 
jected the usual form of the oath, but accepted the penalties of 
perjury, in case their affirmation were not true. 


Similar differences of opinion also existed as to bearing arms; 
but the denial of the right to bear arms was not a tenet of the 
Church as such. 


Under point 17 of the First Private Declaration of Principles 
of the Herrnhut Congregation, ete., Die Buedingischen Samm- 
lungen, Vol. I, pages 52 and 53, under ‘‘ Obedience to constituted 
authorities,’’ the duty of going to war when drawn for a soldier 
is thus set forth. One may seek in an orderly way to escape such 
service; but if he must go, he dare neither desert nor run away 
from the fight, rather permit himself to be slain. But point 18 
follows, which states, that in case of conscientious scruples one 
should risk property and even life rather than sin against con- 
selence. 


This understanding of the case, that the Church as such did 
not at this time make the refusal to take oaths or to do military 
service tenets binding on the membership; but that there were 
among the members those who had scruples as to one or the 
other or both, is also borne out by the language of the Act itself. 
It should be remembered that the wording of the Bill was drawn 
up by General Oglethorpe, in order to suit the Brethren them- 
selves and that for this purpose he was in constant consultation 
with Zinzendorf and their other leaders and with Counsellor 
White, their lawyer. Note the wording of the preamble and also 
the difference which was made between the two exemptions by 
Parliament, with the Brethren agreeing to this difference. The 
preamble reads that ‘‘several of the said Brethren do conscien- 
tiously scruple the taking of an oath and likewise do conscien- 
tiously scruple bearing arms, or personally serving in any mili- 
tary company, although they are willing and ready to contribute 


22 


whatever sums of money shall be thought a reasonable compensa- 
tion for such service and which shall be necessary for the defence 
and support of His majesty’s person and government.’’ If both 
had been tenets of the Church at that time, it is difficult to ex- 
plain how they would have been content with the difference made 
in the Act itself between the two in regard to the scope of exemp- 
tion. It is significant, that whereas exemption from the taking of 
oaths holds good for members of the Brethren’s Church in Great 
Britain and Ireland and in the Colonies and Dominions in 
America, freedom from bearing arms applies only to those who 
reside in America. If military service had been wholly contrary 
to the religious tenets of the Brethren, they must as a matter of 
principle have stood out for exemption from bearing arms in the 
entire British realm, and have not contented themselves with a 
favored position in this respect with reference only to the Amer- 
ican Colonies. ; 

Plainly the main importance of the Act did not lie in the pro- 
vision for exemption of members of the Brethren’s Church under 
given circumstances from taking oaths or from bearing arms. 
It lay in its thus publicly fixing the legal status of the Church 
in British dominions, and in removing in those lands the stigma 
of disloyalty and of sectarianism, which enemies had sought to 
attach to it. The immediate effect was that the Brethren re- 
ceived numerous invitations from personages of prominence to 
form settlements in various parts of England, Scotland, Ireland, 
Maryland, North Carolina (Wachovia resulting here), Nova 
Scotia and even the land about Hudson’s Bay. 


How Count Zinzendorf himself regarded the matter we know 
from an address, delivered by him to his associates in London , 
at a lovefeast on June 8, that is two days after Parliament had 
been notified of the royal approval. Nine main points of this 
address are noted in the Diartum der Huetten. They are these: 

1. The Act counteracts the Hanoverian Edict, referred to 
above. 

2. Fortunately in it the name Moravian yields to the proper 
designation Unitas Fratrum. 

3. The recognition of his own position as Advocatus Fratrum. 

4. Renewal of personal fellowship with the Bishops of the 
Chureh of England. The late Archbishop of Canterbury (Pot- 
ter) had once said, that the English Church would never declare 


23 


that we were not an episcopal church, but would also never de- 
clare that we were one. This has taken place within scarcely a 
year of his death. 

5. Relief for those who are scrupulous with regard to the 
taking of oaths. 

6. Protection against forcible pressing into military service, 
especially for our ministers and for missionaries amongst the 
heathen. 

7. The fortunate embodiment of our Church in the national 
church and protection against the danger of our proselytizing. 
8. The safety of the documents we presented in testimony. 

9. And finally .the wise provision at the close of the Act, which 
will prevent any one else from making unjustified use of the 
name of our Church to cover his own proceedings. 


_ Such were Count Zinzendorf’s conceptions of the value of the 
Act of Parliament at the time. Whether his expectations have 
been justified in the event in each and every respect, may, and 
probably will, be answered differently. Other consequences did 
certainly follow, which he did not mention by anticipation in his 
lovefeast address. However, this much was at once gained: 
The position of Zinzendorf and of his co-workers in England 
now became one of signal honor. London for a time became the 
center of the Unity’s administration. The splendid establish- 
ment at Chelsea was projected, and the Brethren’s Church 
spread rapidly in Britain. Petty annoyances grew less, even 
though controversies did not by any means cease. Abroad and 
especially in British Colonies the status of the missions was 
assured. Prestige followed on the Continent of Europe, and the 
negotiations with Saxony, which had already been promising a 
favorable issue, were undoubtedly influenced advantageously 
and hastened to a close. For in September of that same year, the 
Brethren were granted full liberty of conscience and worship in 
Saxony, in consideration of their substantial adherence to the 
tenets of the Confession of Augsburg. In short it was a turning 
point in the history of the Brethren’s Church which might have 
preceded even larger results, had it not been for the financial 
distresses that followed rapid expansion, and had it not been 
for the impediments placed in the way of the Church’s work by 
the wars of that same era, which, alas! were soon to break out. 


24 


THE ACT OF 1749. 


AN ACT FOR ENCOURAGING THE PEOPLE KNOWN BY THE NAME OF 
Unitas FRATRUM, OR UNITED BRETHREN, TO SETTLE IN HIs 
MAJESTY ’S COLONIES IN AMERICA. 


Whereas many of the People of the Church or Congregations 
ealled the Unitas Fratrum, or United Brethren, are settled in 
His Majesty’s Colonies in America, and demean themselves there 
as a sober, quiet, and industrious People; and many others of the 
same Persuasion are desirous to transport themselves to, and 
make larger Settlements in the said Colonies at their own Ex- 
pence, provided they may be indulged with a full Liberty of 
Conscience, and in the Exercise of the Religion they profess; 
and several of the said Brethren do conscientiously scruple the 
taking of an Oath, and likewise do conscientiously scruple bear- 
ing Arms, or personally serving in any military Capacity, al- 
though they are willing and ready to contribute whatever Sums 
of Money shall be thought a reasonable Compensation for such 
Service, and which shall be necessary for the Defence and Sup- 
port of His Majesty’s Person and Government. And whereas 
said Congregations are an ancient Protestant Episcopal Church, 
which has been countenanced and relieved by the Kings of Eng- 
land, Your Majesty’s Predecessors: And whereas the Encourag- 
ing the said People to settle in America will be beneficial to the 
said Colonies; Therefore may it please Your Majesty, at the 
humble Petition of Abraham Baron of Gersdorff, Lewis Baron of 
Schrautenbach free Lord of Lindheim, David Nitschmann 
Syndie, Charles Schachmann Baron of Hermsdorff, and Henry 
Cossart Agent, Deputies from the said Moravian Churches, in 
Behalf of themselves and their United Brethren, that it may be 
enacted ; and be it therefore enacted by the King’s most Excel- 
lent Majesty, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords 
Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parlia- 
ment assembled, and by the Authority of the same, that from and 
after the Twenty-fourth Day of June, One thousand seven hun- 
dred and forty-nine, every Person being a Member of the said 
Protestant Episcopal Church, known by the Name of Unitas 
Fratrum, or the United Brethren, and which Church was form- 


25 


erly settled in Moravia and Bohemia, and are now in Prussia, 
Poland, Silesia, Lusatia, Germany, the United Provinces, and 
also in His Majesty’s Dominions, who shall be required upon 
any lawful Occasion to take an Oath, in any Case where by Law 
an Oath is or shall be required, shall, instead of the usual Form, 
be permitted to make his or Her solemn Affirmation or Declara- 
tion in these Words following: 


I A.B. do declare in the Presence of Almighty 
God, the Witness of the Truth of what I say. 


Which said solemn Affirmation or Declaration shall be adjudged 
and taken, and is hereby enacted and declared to be of the same 
Force and Effect, to all Intents and Purposes, in all Courts of 
Justice, and other Places where by Law an Oath is or shall be 
required within the Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland and 
also in all and every of His Majesty’s Colonies and Dominions 
in America, as if such Person had taken an Oath in the usual 
Form. 

And be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid, That 
any Person making such solemn Affirmation or Declaration, who 
shall be lawfully convicted, wilfully, falsely, and corruptly, to 
have affirmed or declared any Matter or Thing, which, if the 
same had been deposed on Oath in the usual Form, would have 
amounted to wilful and corrupt Perjury, every such person so 
offending shall incur the same Pains and Penalties, as by the 
Law and Statutes of this Realm are enacted against Persons con- 
victed of wilful and corrupt Perjury. 

Provided, and be it enacted, That no Person being of the said 
Church or Congregation called the Moravian, or United Breth- 
ren, shall by virtue of this Act, be qualified to give Evidence in 
any Criminal Causes, or to serve on Juries; any thing contained 
in this Act to the contrary notwithstanding. 

And be it further enacted, That every Person who is a Mem- 
ber of the said Church or Congregation, who shall reside in any 
of His Majesty’s Colonies in America, who shall at any time 
after the said Twenty-fourth Day of June, One thousand seven 
hundred and forty-nine, be summoned to bear Arms, or do mili- 
tary Service, in any of His Majesty’s said Colonies or Provinces 
of America, shall on his Application to the Governor or Com- 
mander in Chief of the said Colony or Province, or to such officer 


26 


or Person, by whom such Person shall have been summoned or 
required to serve, or be mustered, be discharged from such Per- 
sonal Service; provided that such Person, so desiring to be dis- 
charged from such Personal Service, contribute and pay such 
Sum of Money as shall be rated, assessed, and levied, and be in 
such Proportion, as is usually rated, assessed, levied, and paid, 
by other Persons residing in the same Colony or Province, who 
are by reason of Age, Sex, or other Infirmity, unable to do Per- 
senal Service, and who are possessed of Hstates of the same 
Nature as the Persons desiring such Discharge. 


And to prevent any Doubt which may arise, whether any 
Person, pretending or claiming to be a Member of such Church 
or Congregation, is actually a Member thereof, be it further 
enacted by the Authority aforesaid, That all and every Person 
or Persons whatsoever, who shall, as a Member or Members of 
such Church or Congregation, claim the Benefit of this Act, or 
of any Matter or Thing herein contained, shall, at the Time when | 
he or they make such Claim, produce a Certificate signed by 
some Bishop of the said Church, or by the Pastor of such Church 
or Congregation who shall be nearest to the Place where such 
Claim is made; and shall be examined concerning the Matters 
contained in the said Certificate, and the due Execution thereof ; 
and such Person so affirming to the best of his Knowledge and 
Belief, in Manner herein before-mentioned, or proving by the 
Testimony of other legal Witnesses, that the said Certificate was 
duly executed by such Bishop or Pastor; and also affirming, that 
he is actually a Member of the said Church, known by the name 
of Unitas Fratrum, or United Brethren, shall be adjudged, 
deemed, and to be actually a member of the said Church or 
Congregation, and as such shall be entitled to the Benefit of this 
Act. 


And be it further enacted, That any Person who shall be law- 
fully convicted of having wilfully, falsely, and corruptly, affirm- 
ed or declared in Manner aforesaid, that such Certificate was 
duly executed, or that he is a Member of such Church, when, in 
Fact, such Affirmation is unture, such Person so falsely Affirm- 
ing, and being duly convicted thereof, shall incur the same Pains 
and Penalties, as by the Law and Statutes of this Realm are | 
enacted against Persons convicted of wilful and corrupt Perjury. 


27 


And that it may be Known whether such Bishops and Pastors, 
se signing such Certificates, be of the Church known by the Name 
of Unitas Fratrum, or United Brethren, within the Meaning of 
this Act, be it further enacted, That the Advocate of the said 
Church or Congregation of the United Brethren for the time 
being, shall lay, or cause to be laid, before the Commissioners for 
Trade and Plantations, in order that the same may remain in 
their Office, a List or Lists of all the Bishops of the said Church 
of the United Brethren, who are appointed by them to grant 
Certificates as aforesaid, together with their Hand-writing, and 
usual Seal; and that, from time to time, the said Advocate shall 
send to the said Commissioners for Trade and Plantations the 
Names, Hand-writing, and Seals of any Bishops, that shall be 
hereafter consecrated and appointed by them as aforesaid, and 
the Names of such Pastors as shall be authorized by the said 
Advoeate or Bishops to give Certificates in any of His Majesty’s 
Colonies in America. 

And be it enacted and declared by the Authority aforesaid, 
That this Act shall be deemed, adjudged, and taken to be a 
Publick Act; and shall be judicially taken Notice of as such by 
all Judges, Justices, and other Persons whatsoever, without 
specially pleading the same. 


FINIS. 


















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